DISEASES OF ANIMALS TRANSMISSIBLE TO MAN. 
171 
stand a few of those diseases of animals that are so closely re¬ 
lated to diseases of human beings. Diseases that can be pre¬ 
vented that are both dangerous and deadly, and that are directly 
or indirectly transmissible from the lower animals to man. 
The transinissibility of certain diseases of the lower animals 
to man was known to the ancient Egyptians, and they believed 
that leprosy and other loathsome maladies were caused by eat¬ 
ing meat from hogs and other unclean animals. Moses pre¬ 
scribed rigid laws prohibiting the Israelites from eating meat 
from diseased animals. Some of the laws made by the Romans 
and Greeks relating to veterinary sanitation are in use even to¬ 
day. They separated such animals from healthy ones and. 
ordered the burning of the carcasses of affected animals. In the 
8th century church laws forbade the use of diseased meat. In 
1248, enlightened men, recognizing the dangers of hydrophobia, 
forbade the consumption of meat of animals that had been 
killed by dogs and wolves. It is not my intention to take up 
all the evening going over the history of contagious diseases of 
man and beast; it is enough to say that various laws have been 
in existence since the earliest ages in different countries forbid- 
ing the use of diseased meat for food and for the prevention of 
infection of man by diseases from the lower animals. In the 
present century investigation of the transinissibility of diseases 
of the lower animals to man has shown the important relation of 
some of these diseases to our food supply. It has also convinced 
the investigators of the necessity of the study of comparative 
medicine to properly deal with our foods of animal origin and 
to effectually combat and prevent many of those diseases com¬ 
municable to man. Modern medicine tends to the prevention 
of diseases through a better understanding of the means of 
transmission and perpetuation. With these ends in view some 
of our medical colleges have established chairs of comparative 
medicine. It is leading to appreciation of the necessity of es¬ 
tablishing a more competent system of sanitary officers that 
shall properly guard the animal food supply of our people and 
promote the health of our animals by judicious State laws. 
